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Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

This is even more extreme with Grey Knights - even though much less people play those, the number of minis surely outnumbers the "real" Grey Knights by orders of magnitude. Heck, just a single Grey Knight army organization plan - 3 Elites, 6 Troops, 3 Fast Attack, 3 Heavy Support, an army that could be owned and played by a single player, can theoretically field just about half of all the psycannons that officially exist in the WH40k universe, and have more Purifiers than exist in the entire chapter most of the time!

That is a fact that never fails to amuse me. I actually feel terrible sometimes when playing DoW I or II. Dreadnought down? Why, build another. Or two! Those got shot down? We have reserves!

I mean, I bet it is rare for Space Marines to die during an engagement, especially with an inferior foe, but in the game, they die in the masses.

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

That is a fact that never fails to amuse me. I actually feel terrible sometimes when playing DoW I or II. Dreadnought down? Why, build another. Or two! Those got shot down? We have reserves!

I mean, I bet it is rare for Space Marines to die during an engagement, especially with an inferior foe, but in the game, they die in the masses.

I suspect most of the engagements we play during the game represent the very worst fighting (apart from a few huge campaigns that it would be difficult to get enough models for, and then you'd need the space to do it) a space marine experiences.

Actually, what do Space Marines do when they're not fighting hive fleets, traitor marines, or some of the nastier xenos species (Eldar of both varieties, Necrons and the Tau are starting to become more recognized threats)?

Actually, what do Space Marines do when they're not fighting hive fleets, traitor marines, or some of the nastier xenos species (Eldar of both varieties, Necrons and the Tau are starting to become more recognized threats)?

Train. Then train some more. And maybe a bit more training.

Though it depends on the Chapter. Space Marine, though only semi-canon, is probably the only novel that really deals with (non-Wolf) Marine downtime. The Imperial Fists pray, fight honour duels, scrimshaw bones, study in the library and even seem to just 'hang around' at times.
Salamanders go amongst their local populace and train at the anvil.
Blood Angels do artificing type stuff - creating uber buff chestplates and such like.
Space Wolves party, tell tall tales and stay up late braiding each others' hair and talking about which Chapter Master is the hunkiest (Azreal's so dark and brooding! No, Calgar's way more buff! Well I think Dante's just hte cutest!) beards.
Iron Hands presumably do tech related things for amusement.
Ultramarines stand in front of the mirror and flex while telling themselves how awesome they are and that everyone else is just jealous.
Dark Angels brood and skulk in the shadows.
Lamenters write terrible, depressing poetry.
(some of the last ones may not be canon).

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

Originally Posted by Borgh

The problem is the time between the horus heresy and the point where a lost chapter showing up gets plausible. I'd assume that for quite a while after the second founding every chapters heritage was well documented so we are talking third founding on the earliest and lexicanum puts that at the start of M32, a thousand years after the second founding. A thousand years in which they have to stay hidden. The blood ravens own histories start in M37, seven thousand years after the Heresy. Thats a lot of time to fill.

Imagine this, for seven thousand years:
time M34.532
+++Sender: the Battle Barge Litany of Fury Emperors Aquila+++
Space marine: Hail, governor! we are the who are we this time again? we are the Eagle warriors! We have come to your planet for recruitment!
Governor: Welcome honoured brothers! Pray tell, what brings you to this humble planet? I thought the eagle warriors are three sectors away?
Space marine: they are? well crap Uhm it was a warpstorm. Yeah, the warp did it. So please just let us recruit some of your psykers and we will be off again.

And not one Inquisitor catching up.

Suppose they recruited exclusively from feral or pre-Industrial age worlds where there's no global government or overall Governor in charge. All they'd have to do is roll up, call themselves Angels of the Emperor and recruit any who want to join.

As noted in one of the argument posts, most citizens would jump at the chance given the mythology of the Emperor and the Astartes.

As for recruiting psykers exclusively, it could well be that the selection process is biased towards psykers (whether by accident or design) or the BR geneeseed has a habit of awakening latent talents, so they just end up with a higher proportion of psykers in their numbers.

Either way, by keeping a low profile, the average inquisitor isn't going to investigate every occasion of an unidentified Astartes chapter recruiting on the fringes of Imperial space. The aforementioned Space Sharks weren't 'discovered' until M41, even though rumours suggest they existed in M32.

With regards to the gaps in their history, many of the less famous chapters have missing sections or unknown foundings, either from war, accident or simple neglect. Not every Chapter is as scrupulous as the Ultramarines or their successor chapters in maintaining their history.

Originally Posted by Squark

Actually, what do Space Marines do when they're not fighting hive fleets, traitor marines, or some of the nastier xenos species (Eldar of both varieties, Necrons and the Tau are starting to become more recognized threats)?

As Zorg says, it depends on their chapter. The Lexicanum has a small page on their daily rituals:

Originally Posted by Lexicanum

0400 - Morning Prayer - Led by the Company Chaplain, the Space Marines renew their oaths to the Emperor and the company relics are displayed. This time is also used to give out orders, announcements and other administrative tasks.

0500 - Morning Firing Rites - The Space Marines engage in target practice with their personal and squad weaponry, awards and punishments are dispensed for consistently good or poor accuracy respectively.

0700 - Battle Practice - Generally this is close quarters oriented, however live fire or hazardous environment training may be done instead (or as well).

1200 - Midday Prayer - In addition to prayer any injured Space Marines can report to the Apothecary.

1315 - Tactical Indoctrination - This can take many forms, from information on a new alien species or technology to strategy. A debrief of the morning's battle is common as well.

1500 - Battle Practice - This focuses more on combined tactics in conjunction with vehicles, Dreadnoughts and devastator squads and normally includes a trial of a new tactic introduced during the tactical indoctrination.

2000 - Evening Prayer - In addition to prayer, gene-seed testing may occur at this point.

2100 - Evening Meal - A feast (by normal human standards) is provided by the Chapter serfs, and some Chapter Masters may allow alcohol to be consumed.

2130 - Night Firing Exercises - If the chapter is based on a planet where there is no perceptible night or they are based on a fleet, firing exercises are under taken in exotic environments such as underwater, through dense fog or smoke or in zero gravity.

2315 - Maintenance Rituals - Each Space Marine is expected to maintain his own power armour and weapons, and it is often checked by the Chapter's Techmarines.

2345 - Free Time - Space Marines are permitted this time to reflect upon their duty to The Emperor, however many Chapter Masters regard free time as a frivolous waste, and a dangerous distraction in the extreme.

0000 - Rest Period - Space Marines are allocated 4 hours in which to sleep.

However, I believe this routine is only applicable to a normal battle brother at headquarters or training facility (not to those on patrol duty in ships) and officers (including non-comms) would spend more time in tactical study and intelligence assessments from the surrounding areas.

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

Huh, space marines actually get free time. Wonder what the Chaos Space marines do when they're not rampaging/torturing slaves.

Death Guard hop on a scale and frown
Night Lords hide in their rooms, turn off the lights, and act like Batman
Thousand Son's read books and try to stop their heads from exploding
Alpha Legion sit around a table and play RISK all day
World Eaters pound their heads against each other and scream
Iron Warriors assemble card board box forts and sit in them
Word Bearer's summon daemons for the lulz
Emperor's Children listen to music and pass a bong around
Son's of Horus compete with Ultramarines on who's awesomer

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

Angron - turned crazy by non-Imperial slave owners. Ignored orders to not put the red nails in his men, turning a lot of them crazy.

Wrong, he still had some shreds of sanity and decency. It's when the emperor arrives and separates him from his companions and then makes him watch as they're butchered that he completely loses it.

Originally Posted by Zorg

Mortarion - Raised by alien (possibly Dark Eldar), which doesn't help, he was betrayed by Typhus who was corrupt from the get-go.

I'll admit I don't know a lot about that one so I'll trust your word.

Originally Posted by Zorg

Magnus - Made deal with Tzeentch before he met the Emperor, fall came due to his breaking of the Emperor's laws.

He broke it because the Emperor needed to be warned. The emperor then thanked him by unleashing Russ on Magnus, thus forcing him to completely turn to chaos or turn in furry food.

Originally Posted by Zorg

Lorgar - Corrupted by Erebus, who never renounced the Chaos worship he had before the Emperor arrived. Also thought he was putting humanity on the path to true enlightenment.

Not really. Lorgar started worshiping the emperor. The emperor rejected that kind of behaviour and claimed there was no such thing as gods (aka a blatant lie). Lorgar then goes to find out that there are indeed gods, and they want to be worshiped, and thus the IoM is being built in lies.

Originally Posted by Zorg

Alpharius - did what he thought was right to stop Chaos in the long run.

The road to hell the warp is filled with good intentions. Joining the side with daemon weapons and daemons however wasn't exactly a very smart choice if you want to fight against chaos.

Originally Posted by Zorg

Fulgrim - hubris combined with naiveté, plain and simple. When he realised he was out of his depth and had made a terrible mistake, a Daemon posessed him.

He also only got that daemonic sword because he insisted on fully exterminating other race just for the evulz, so he never had any traces of good on him.

Originally Posted by Zorg

Horus - was an idiot who was tricked by Chaos and betrayed by his own men into creating the horrible edifice of the modern day Imperium through destroying the works of the Crusade.

Yet the Emperor picked him anyway as the warmaster.

Lo and behold, the first Commander Incopentus in the IoM's history! The emperor is guilty of seting this dangerous standard for the IoM of not bothering to check if the people you're puting in charge are idiots and/or easily trickeable.

Originally Posted by Zorg

The only ones the Imperium could be faulted for (and then only in part) are Curze for being forced into the role of bogeyman given his already damaged psyche from landing in Gotham City a non-Imperial crapsack world.

Fully IoM fault. Curze was actualy doing a fine job of turning that world in a better place, then when he leaves whatever administration forces that were left behind let it get to the old ways.

Originally Posted by Zorg

The other is Peturabo, who basically threw a temper tantrum because he didn't like guard duty and lost it completely when his world rebelled.
Neither of those really have to do with corruption either, just the Primarchs rebelling against their assigned roles.

Most of the traitors turned traitor due to petty jealousies with each other played upon by the corrupted legionnaires, or due to misunderstanding or underestimating chaos (Lorgar and Magnus respectively).
Many of them did things despite the Emperor specifically saying "do not do this thing", which really didn't help matters (Angron, Lorgar, Magnus).

Yet the emperor was completely random on how to deal with those issues:

-Angron performing lobotomies on his troops turning them into bloodthirsty monsters? Let it slide for emperor knows how much time.

-Magnus tries to warn him of his brother's treacheries with magic? Unleash the furry hordes on him!

Originally Posted by Zorg

The lack of understanding of the role of chaos is pretty fundamental, as most of the traitors don't even realise they're working for the Chaos gods until much later. For instance in the end of Nemesis a huge sacrifice is performed with the victims arranged in an eight-pointed star. Some of the watching Sons of Horus don't understand why they're doing it, and are troubled by it.

Lorgar is horrified by what happens to Fulgrim when he discovers the truth, as he thinks the warp powers just want to party
(Aurelian).
Magnus thinks he's smarter than Tzeentch, making a deal he comes to regret after breaking the Emperor's laws (A Thousand Sons).

Please remind me, how exactly is they not knowing what they're doing, and yet doing it anyway, a better thing?

Originally Posted by Zorg

The Emperor himself is guilty of this too, thinking that supressing the knowledge of the warp powers would be enough to stop them - but then again he has to be or the whole story would break down.

And now we've hit the critical point. The history only works if the emperor seriously believes "If I close everybody eyes and ears, chaos can't hurt us!".

And the emperor is the central point of the IoM. Which brings us to

Originally Posted by Zorg

Except their corruption had nothing to do with the Imperium, at least not the Imperium as an institution:

For all effects, the IoM is the emperor. His orders were and are still absolute (if you claim you hear his voice, then you're given high positions instead of being thrown in the loony house). Thus all of the emperor's faults end up reflecting in the IoM. His errors back then echo trough 10.000 years.

Originally Posted by Zorg

Though it's not mentioned much nowadays, some of the older background material relates how the Chaos Legions hate themselves for what they've become, but because they're twisted by chaos they blame the Imperium for letting it happen to them.

And they're actualy right for it. Many of them were put in positions where chaos was indeed the only answer (Lorgar wanted something to worship, Magnus had no other way to try to warn the emperor, Angrom wanted revenge, etc).

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

And now we've hit the critical point. The history only works if the emperor seriously believes "If I close everybody eyes and ears, chaos can't hurt us!".

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, NO, NO, NO, NO!

Every one of your posts to date in this thread has been uniformed and trollish, but the willful ignorance and blatent ignoring of canon in this statement is absurd to the point of incredulity. Your post history as a whole is a fractal of wrongness, but I will address only this one point so as not to go overboard on a rant of mythic proportions.

The Emperor was working to kill the chaos gods, and actually doing a pretty good job of it. The chaos gods are fed primarily by two things: the emotions of sentient beings, and active worship. The second one being the key one that feeds them more, as the levels of emotion required to feed them substantially is orders of magnitudes greater compared to how much outright worship does.

Given that chaos gods/deamons in general, and tzeench and his ones in particular have a history of disguising themselves as religious figures in order to syphon off worship for their own empowerment, the emperor was stamping out relegion specifically to deny the chaos gods this source of food, and also to calm the warp. This plan of his was working. Know how we know this? 30K ships didn't require a giant psychic warp lighthouse navigate around the galaxy. Navigation in the "present" without the light of astronomicon is almost impossible.

So when the Emperor went after their food sources, the chaos gods had to fight back before they got starved out completely. The fact that they were able to do so doesn't make the Emperor's plan stupid, or even invalid. Especially since it was working. He just happened to be the single worst father ever, and so his sons didn't turn out too well, and were easily corruptable by chaos.

Claspedchurches: This is a mudstone dwarven fortress. All craftsdwarfship is of the highest quality. It is encrusted with bauxite, studded with ice, decorated with gold, and adorned with hanging rings of magma. This fortress menaces with spikes of steel, iron, bronze, and silver. On the fortress is an image of an image of cheese in pitchblende.

On the fortress is an image of a megaweapon in gold, silver, jet, obsidian and adamantine. The goblins are burning.

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

And now we've hit the critical point. The history only works if the emperor seriously believes "If I close everybody eyes and ears, chaos can't hurt us!".

Hey, if it's stupid and it works, it ain't stupid.

There's some debate over whether this was the best course of action. However, there's no question that it was what the Emperor thought was the best choice. And if he was wrong, that's due to a misunderstanding of how the warp works. And just because a scientist is operating on a misunderstanding is no reason to call them an idiot.

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

Wrong, he still had some shreds of sanity and decency. It's when the emperor arrives and separates him from his companions and then makes him watch as they're butchered that he completely loses it.

Hardly the fault of the Adeptus Terra either way - and a pretty poor reason for deciding to join in with the extermination/enslavement of the human race.

He broke it because the Emperor needed to be warned. The emperor then thanked him by unleashing Russ on Magnus, thus forcing him to completely turn to chaos or turn in furry food.

Except, as Outcast Dead lays out, the Emperor already knew. A Thousand Sons also portrays Magnus' idea as wanting to prove that sorcery can be useful (and his being a puppet for Tzeentch the whole time after their deal).
Magnus also ignored Russ' pleas to surrender, and willingly accepted his punishment (in fact exacerbating the punishment by ignoring Russ, who was willing to simply bring him in to Terra unharmed [Prospero Burns]) as he believed he deserved it for breaking his father's wishes. He only took the out offered by Tzeentch when he couldn't bear seeing his sons slaughtered anymore.

Not really. Lorgar started worshiping the emperor. The emperor rejected that kind of behaviour and claimed there was no such thing as gods (aka a blatant lie). Lorgar then goes to find out that there are indeed gods, and they want to be worshiped, and thus the IoM is being built in lies.

Thus he decides to destroy humanity. If Kor Phaeron and Erebus hadn't been going around worshipping the chaos gods Lorgar wouldn't have had them whispering in his ear (or if Lorgar told them to bugger off, or questioned the Emperor on this new information). Lorgar sided with the gods, not because he had some pathalogical desire to give worship, but because the gods told him they sought to meld humans with warp powers into single perfect beings. He saw this as the end result of worship, achieving a higher plain of existence.
This is, of course, completely wrong (i.e. an outright lie) as a very select few acheive daemon prince status, and most are consumed or destroyed.

Note that at no point does he question "hey, maybe there's a reason dad never told me about this?", or go and ask the Emperor why he lied.

The road to hell the warp is filled with good intentions. Joining the side with daemon weapons and daemons however wasn't exactly a very smart choice if you want to fight against chaos.

The plan was that if Horus won he'd end up exterminating humanity and starve the chaos gods of mankind's power, killing them permanently.

Yet the Emperor picked him anyway as the warmaster.:smallamused

:Lo and behold, the first Commander Incopentus in the IoM's history! The emperor is guilty of seting this dangerous standard for the IoM of not bothering to check if the people you're puting in charge are idiots and/or easily trickeable.

The issue is that up until that point Horus has been shown to be super intelligent, cunning and wise - his fall really makes no sense in character as presented by the novels.
It's adaption decay from the 20 odd years of the story. In the first version of the Heresy tale Horus was simply a man, the greatest general of humanity, who was straight up posessed by a warp entity.
If HH series Horus was posessed his turn to evil, while boring, would make sense. As is he gets one wobbly vision after getting stabbed and decides to believe it over every other piece of evidence he has.

I'd call that the writers having to force the plot to fit the background rather than any sinister foreshadowing of the future of the Imperium or incompetence on the Emperor's part. We are, after all, told explicitly that Horus is the greatest commander in the Galaxy - master of war, philosppher of tactics, leader of men.
It is presented as an undeniable fact backed up by his litany of successes. Horus was put in charge because he was quite literally made to be the perfect commander. His fall, as written, is the weakest of any of the Primarchs and shows that it was quite early in the series when they'd not finalised a lot of the tone and feel of the series. Compare the suddenness of Horus' heel turn to Magnus', which only comes at the very end of A Thosand Sons and isn't really a turn at all, or to Lorgar's which is very nuanced and spread across several books.

Fully IoM fault. Curze was actualy doing a fine job of turning that world in a better place, then when he leaves whatever administration forces that were left behind let it get to the old ways.

If by 'fine job' you mean murdering everyone he feels is wrong, and terrorising the population into submission (pre-Emperor). Weren't you complaining about the Imperium doing that sort of thing in the 41st millenium?
He didn't institute any real societal or political changes, he just terrorised everyone until they behaved and then left - I'm hardly surprised the planet went back to the crapper.
Also note that his solution was not to re-pacify the planet, but to blow it up. I guess that's the Imperium's fault for giving him weapons that powerful, right?

Yet the emperor was completely random on how to deal with those issues:

-Angron performing lobotomies on his troops turning them into bloodthirsty monsters? Let it slide for emperor knows how much time.

-Magnus tries to warn him of his brother's treacheries with magic? Unleash the furry hordes on him!

It's not a lobotomy, and some of the background material says the Emperor was going to censure the World Eaters (and Night Lords) for their ever mroe extreme actions, but they rebelled first.
Magnus I've already covered.

Please remind me, how exactly is they not knowing what they're doing, and yet doing it anyway, a better thing?

I'm not saying it is - I'm saying it's worse and the perpetrators are culpable as they didn't think "hmm... maybe I should ask the Emperor, who obviously knows more about this stuff than he's saying, what he thinks of these visions/premenitions/ideas rather than just doing it anyway?"

And now we've hit the critical point. The history only works if the emperor seriously believes "If I close everybody eyes and ears, chaos can't hurt us!".

And it could've - Alpharius' plan was the same thing except everybody dies instead of everybody just forgetting about Chaos. Religions can be wiped out, as can history, by supressing it thorougly enough - it's one of the main themes of the Heresy books even!

And the emperor is the central point of the IoM. Which brings us to

For all effects, the IoM is the emperor. His orders were and are still absolute (if you claim you hear his voice, then you're given high positions instead of being thrown in the loony house). Thus all of the emperor's faults end up reflecting in the IoM. His errors back then echo trough 10.000 years.

You're arging about the culpability of the Imperium for the fall of the Primarchs using both the pre-and post Heresy governmental systems? I know time flows differently in the warp but come on, that's a real stretch.

The Primarchs were not bound by the Adeptus Terra, which hadn't fully formed by the time the Heresy broke out, and were operating as military commanders. They conquered worlds and carried the banner of Terra to the stars, the administration of the worlds after they left completely independant of them (one of the things Lorgar got wrong).
The Emperor ordered them to do and not do certain things. One common thing the traitors almost all have is that they did not do or did anyway these things.
The faults of the 'modern' Imperium are mostly things the Emperor was against - his worship, superstition, dogma. In Outcast Dead an Astropath has visions of the 40k universe, and is so horrified by what he sees compared to waht they're working towards, he kills himself.

So if the traitors hadn't turned, the Imperium would still be lead by the Emperor, had access to the webway, a complete STC system, have little need for Inquisitors, and be generally a pretty cool place to be.

And they're actualy right for it. Many of them were put in positions where chaos was indeed the only answer (Lorgar wanted something to worship, Magnus had no other way to try to warn the emperor, Angrom wanted revenge, etc).

In the case of Lorgar, lacking something is no reason to taking the absolute worst possible alternative. Wish you had a girlfriend? Have some heroin! Your boss told you off and made you do a job you don't like? Kill him and all your co-workers!
When those things happen in real life it is a tradgedy, and the person involved is either seen as a victim of those who manipulated them or an insane monster.

Magnus didn't need to warn the Emperor, he already knew. Furthermore Magnus acknowledged that he did was a terrible, unforgivable mistake and the Emperor was right all along.

Angron was angry his fellows were left to die - of course he's right to decide to worship the god of bloodshed and seek to murder ever living thing in the galaxy!

There of course existed Option C, (A being do as they're told, B being turn to evil) which none of them explored - talk to the Emperor about these things. But, I suppose that's the Imperium's fault too

Princess in the streets.
Princess in the sheets.
Don't touch me I'm royalty.

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

For all effects, the IoM is the emperor. His orders were and are still absolute (if you claim you hear his voice, then you're given high positions instead of being thrown in the loony house).

And it's not like you can just say "Hey, the Emperor told me to say this, so you CANNOT question it." There are entire branches within both the Inquisition AND the Ministorum devoted to verifying such things, and exterminating any who are discovered to lie. This is a wobbly thing, of course, since there is little way of proving or disproving faith safe for obvious miracles (which DO happen, but even then, they're questioned, just like in modern religions).

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

For my upcoming Rogue Trader RPG I'll be running I'm going to be making a fake newspaper, the Koronus Gazetter, which will have some info pertaining to adventure hooks, as well as gossip and suchlike. For instance the 'first issue' will be have the headline about the Emperor's Bounty and her crew being declared officially Lost to the Warp, and that it is now free salvage (obvious first plot). The back page is Rogue Tradin', a gossip mag type run detailing rumours and scandals the characters' contemporaries are getting up to. I'll also put things in like advertisements of merchants and whatnot.

For instance one plot hook is a merchant being hugely overstocked with bolters... but they're all crap and he doesn't have ammo. The one guy who has ammo is charging ridiculous prices. The two cooked up a deal to produce knock-off bolters on the cheap and gouge the price of shells, working the margins to make a huge profit.
This will simply be an advertisement that merchant X has bolters! Bolters! Bolters!

I'm using the standard setting of the Koronus Expanse bordering the Calixis sector. I'm just looking for some ideas for filler or minor side plots mostly (humourous is fine too - "Silent prayer of Chanting? Which is more effective?" etc).

Princess in the streets.
Princess in the sheets.
Don't touch me I'm royalty.

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

For my upcoming Rogue Trader RPG I'll be running I'm going to be making a fake newspaper, the Koronus Gazetter, which will have some info pertaining to adventure hooks, as well as gossip and suchlike. For instance the 'first issue' will be have the headline about the Emperor's Bounty and her crew being declared officially Lost to the Warp, and that it is now free salvage (obvious first plot). The back page is Rogue Tradin', a gossip mag type run detailing rumours and scandals the characters' contemporaries are getting up to. I'll also put things in like advertisements of merchants and whatnot.

For instance one plot hook is a merchant being hugely overstocked with bolters... but they're all crap and he doesn't have ammo. The one guy who has ammo is charging ridiculous prices. The two cooked up a deal to produce knock-off bolters on the cheap and gouge the price of shells, working the margins to make a huge profit.
This will simply be an advertisement that merchant X has bolters! Bolters! Bolters!

I'm using the standard setting of the Koronus Expanse bordering the Calixis sector. I'm just looking for some ideas for filler or minor side plots mostly (humourous is fine too - "Silent prayer of Chanting? Which is more effective?" etc).

There are large numbers of bolters on the black market? I thought they were so finicky without daily maintenance (one of the reasons the IG doesn't use them for foot soldiers is that regular guardsman don't get the training they need to maintain them).

But I digress.

Anyway, Ciaphas Cain makes reference to Scrumball (some sort of rugby like game, judging by his description of the violence in the game), and there was apparently some sort of inter-planetary league of some kind.

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

For my upcoming Rogue Trader RPG I'll be running I'm going to be making a fake newspaper, the Koronus Gazetter, which will have some info pertaining to adventure hooks, as well as gossip and suchlike. For instance the 'first issue' will be have the headline about the Emperor's Bounty and her crew being declared officially Lost to the Warp, and that it is now free salvage (obvious first plot). The back page is Rogue Tradin', a gossip mag type run detailing rumours and scandals the characters' contemporaries are getting up to. I'll also put things in like advertisements of merchants and whatnot.

I guess you can find a myriad of sports, and associated leagues and cups or whatnot on every world and in every sector. Bloodsport seems to be prevalent, and you could fill a page with betting tips, biographies and assessments of gladiators and news of fabulous new beasts which are going to see action the next month, so that bettors and fans can inform themselves about their favourite gladiators.

But I guess they wouldn't mention the Warp specifically, rather going for euphemisms like "lost in the void" or something.

And finally, a humorous story, with serious implications if you want it:

a high Ministorum priest, Father Helgond, was found robbed of his possesions and obviously drunk and full of substances in the sewers of some hive's underbelly, near a hotel/tavern/brothel frequented by traders and merchants of all sorts (and he can call himself lucky that the Arbites found him first!). The shocking fact is that Father Helgond was one of the world's most zealous preacher against the evils of Rogue Traders and the filth and corruption they bring with them, frequently naming individuals, or cursing sind and vice and all who engage in it.
Now, Father Helgond claims that he was investigating an evil cult bent on enslaving hapless patrons with their promises of forbidden lusts, which, giventhe establishment he was investiagating, isn't exactly impossible. Understandably, most Rogue Traders and others who have had the pleasure of being object of the good father's rages use this opportunity to mock and ridicule him. But what if it's true?

Bonus GrimDark points if the good Father has stumbled on a genestealer coven and is now infected. You could do a couple story sections of the Father's spectacular fall from grace and subsequent retirement into seclusion, then his coming back with a new reformed cult of the Emperor, with a message of the sinful to redeem themselves in the Emperor's light (the Father should know, right?) and has an amazing conversion rate of new followers.
Let the story sit for a while, then make mention of the new civil war on the planet and a bit later, the subsequent discovery of a genestealer infestation (which the players can either join in on the shooting, help supply Imperial forces, or steer well clear).

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

Originally Posted by Brother Oni

Bonus GrimDark points if the good Father has stumbled on a genestealer coven and is now infected. You could do a couple story sections of the Father's spectacular fall from grace and subsequent retirement into seclusion, then his coming back with a new reformed cult of the Emperor, with a message of the sinful to redeem themselves in the Emperor's light (the Father should know, right?) and has an amazing conversion rate of new followers.
Let the story sit for a while, then make mention of the new civil war on the planet and a bit later, the subsequent discovery of a genestealer infestation (which the players can either join in on the shooting, help supply Imperial forces, or steer well clear).

Nice one. Genestealer infestations are always fun.

Hmm... Do the 40k rulebooks have rules for the players getting infected? Now, for novices, you'd probably have to just kill the character, but if someone's a good enough role-player... Could make for an interesting story...

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

Originally Posted by Squark

There are large numbers of bolters on the black market? I thought they were so finicky without daily maintenance (one of the reasons the IG doesn't use them for foot soldiers is that regular guardsman don't get the training they need to maintain them).

Actually, a lot of IG officers in Cain series seems to use bolt weapons, not to mention covers of books in said series...

Originally Posted by deuterio12

He broke it because the Emperor needed to be warned. The emperor then thanked him by unleashing Russ on Magnus, thus forcing him to completely turn to chaos or turn in furry food.

What you miss, is that the Magnus almost turned Terra into a daemon world, yet was only supposed to be brought back for questioning. How is that evil, exactly?

Also, he could, I don't know, take the message with him on a ship? He had plenty of time.

Not really. Lorgar started worshiping the emperor. The emperor rejected that kind of behaviour and claimed there was no such thing as gods (aka a blatant lie). Lorgar then goes to find out that there are indeed gods, and they want to be worshiped, and thus the IoM is being built in lies.

And that warrants mass genocide how exactly?

Not to mention the fact of them being "gods" is also a lie.

He also only got that daemonic sword because he insisted on fully exterminating other race just for the evulz, so he never had any traces of good on him.

You mean the race that was so completely gone to chaos they all had warp mutations?

It's like arguing unit of soldiers shooting mob of suicide bombers approaching them is evil.

-Magnus tries to warn him of his brother's treacheries with magic? Unleash the furry hordes on him!

The kind of magic that was expressly forbidden due to dangers it brings?

What he did is warning President about alien invasion by dropping fully armed atomic bomb on Washington D.C. forcing defenders to divert all their forces to locate and disarm it instead of fighting aliens.

For all effects, the IoM is the emperor. His orders were and are still absolute (if you claim you hear his voice, then you're given high positions instead of being thrown in the loony house). Thus all of the emperor's faults end up reflecting in the IoM. His errors back then echo trough 10.000 years.

A) He hated all these things; B) If you would claim the above, better pray you won't come across Ecclesiarchy or Hereticus, as such claim will meet with business end of combi-flamer rather quickly.

And they're actualy right for it. Many of them were put in positions where chaos was indeed the only answer (Lorgar wanted something to worship, Magnus had no other way to try to warn the emperor, Angrom wanted revenge, etc).

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

Hardly the fault of the Adeptus Terra either way - and a pretty poor reason for deciding to join in with the extermination/enslavement of the human race.

His whole legion just stood there watching as Angrom's companions were butchered. What do you think that teached the primarch? First impressions are quite important.

Originally Posted by Zorg

Except, as Outcast Dead lays out, the Emperor already knew.

I've seen that claim here and there, but honestly, it simply doesn't make any sense. If the emperor knew Horus was a traitor, why did he leave him around still giving orders (like telling the furries to kill Magnus instead of capturing him)?

Originally Posted by Zorg

A Thousand Sons also portrays Magnus' idea as wanting to prove that sorcery can be useful (and his being a puppet for Tzeentch the whole time after their deal).
Magnus also ignored Russ' pleas to surrender, and willingly accepted his punishment (in fact exacerbating the punishment by ignoring Russ, who was willing to simply bring him in to Terra unharmed [Prospero Burns]) as he believed he deserved it for breaking his father's wishes. He only took the out offered by Tzeentch when he couldn't bear seeing his sons slaughtered anymore.

As already pointed out Russ had orders to kill from corrupted Horus, so I don't see how he could be asking for surrender. It doesn't say anything about that here, and it doesn't fit either with the rest of your quote. So Russ is willing to butcher the thousand sons to the last man, but Magnus gets the chance to come unharmed? Shouldn't this the time Magnus goes "Do what you want with me, but spare my subordinates!".

It just doesn't make much sense that Magnus is in one moment "All my legion and world must die in bloody battle"(he could've just nuked his own planet, an IoM classic) and the next he goes "Save me Tzenceth I'll do whatever you want!".

Originally Posted by Zorg

Thus he decides to destroy humanity. If Kor Phaeron and Erebus hadn't been going around worshipping the chaos gods Lorgar wouldn't have had them whispering in his ear (or if Lorgar told them to bugger off, or questioned the Emperor on this new information). Lorgar sided with the gods, not because he had some pathalogical desire to give worship, but because the gods told him they sought to meld humans with warp powers into single perfect beings. He saw this as the end result of worship, achieving a higher plain of existence.

Well, last time I checked people never performed worship just for the sake of it. They worship because they believe it will bring them some sort of good/advantage. Lorgar believed worship was a powerful tool, and its quite ironic his works ended up being used to create the IoM's own religion.

Originally Posted by Zorg

Note that at no point does he question "hey, maybe there's a reason dad never told me about this?", or go and ask the Emperor why he lied.

Last time I checked, the Emperor was never amused for being questioned in any kind of matter, neither was the kind of person to explain his actions. He's more the kind of "I'm gonna seal myself on my lab, not telling you what I'll be working in, and you're all forbidden from interrupting me".

Originally Posted by Zorg

The plan was that if Horus won he'd end up exterminating humanity and starve the chaos gods of mankind's power, killing them permanently.

Not a very good plan, since the chaos gods do feed on other races. Slanesh was spawned by the eldar and everything.

Originally Posted by Zorg

The issue is that up until that point Horus has been shown to be super intelligent, cunning and wise - his fall really makes no sense in character as presented by the novels.
It's adaption decay from the 20 odd years of the story. In the first version of the Heresy tale Horus was simply a man, the greatest general of humanity, who was straight up posessed by a warp entity.
If HH series Horus was posessed his turn to evil, while boring, would make sense. As is he gets one wobbly vision after getting stabbed and decides to believe it over every other piece of evidence he has.

I'd call that the writers having to force the plot to fit the background rather than any sinister foreshadowing of the future of the Imperium or incompetence on the Emperor's part. We are, after all, told explicitly that Horus is the greatest commander in the Galaxy - master of war, philosppher of tactics, leader of men.
It is presented as an undeniable fact backed up by his litany of successes. Horus was put in charge because he was quite literally made to be the perfect commander. His fall, as written, is the weakest of any of the Primarchs and shows that it was quite early in the series when they'd not finalised a lot of the tone and feel of the series. Compare the suddenness of Horus' heel turn to Magnus', which only comes at the very end of A Thosand Sons and isn't really a turn at all, or to Lorgar's which is very nuanced and spread across several books.

Indeed Horus's story hasn't aged very well. But since the most recent fluff seems to qualify as the most valid, he's now a Commander Incopentus
by betraying his father for just a vision.

Originally Posted by Zorg

If by 'fine job' you mean murdering everyone he feels is wrong, and terrorising the population into submission (pre-Emperor). Weren't you complaining about the Imperium doing that sort of thing in the 41st millenium?

Unless he had his personal bomber and went doing strafing runs on the cities, he couldn't really rack up anywhere the same kill count of your average IoM planetary government. One of his main characteristics was actually being discret. People he doesn't like show up dead, but everybody else around didn't even notice he was then, instead of dying as colateral damage.

Originally Posted by Zorg

He didn't institute any real societal or political changes, he just terrorised everyone until they behaved and then left - I'm hardly surprised the planet went back to the crapper.

He left because the emperor ordered him to do so (and we all know how good an idea is disagreeing with the emperor). He couldn't have really changed anything before whitout trustworhy loyal followers. He could've maybe done something with his legion, but hey, gotta go conquer more planets for daddy or he'll be mad (trivia, the emperor quite disliked that Lorgar took his time to make sure the conquered populations were properly subjugated before moving on).

Originally Posted by Zorg

Also note that his solution was not to re-pacify the planet, but to blow it up. I guess that's the Imperium's fault for giving him weapons that powerful, right?

You're forgeting the part where Curze had horrific visions of the future, and when he tried to talk about how he felt with the other primarchs, they all refused to help him sort out his head. Trillions of people in the IoM, not any kind of mental doctor or friendly voice to help him. Anyone suprised he ended up turning?

Originally Posted by Zorg

It's not a lobotomy, and some of the background material says the Emperor was going to censure the World Eaters (and Night Lords) for their ever mroe extreme actions, but they rebelled first.

Indeed it says that, but usually you'll want to have a good talk with your commanders/sons after the first news of something being wrong with them, not when they have already rampaged trough countless planets. He left them run wild just too much time.

Originally Posted by Zorg

Magnus I've already covered.

You still haven't covered why Cruze blowing up his own homeworld and then going into a campaign of terrior is something that can be archived to take care of later, but Magnus doing one communication spell is reason for immediate repriesal.

Originally Posted by Zorg

I'm not saying it is - I'm saying it's worse and the perpetrators are culpable as they didn't think "hmm... maybe I should ask the Emperor, who obviously knows more about this stuff than he's saying, what he thinks of these visions/premenitions/ideas rather than just doing it anyway?"

And again, the fluff points again and again that the Emperor wasn't really much for family discussions and/or mental support. He left quite clear that his orders were to be obeyed, never questioned.

Originally Posted by Zorg

And it could've - Alpharius' plan was the same thing except everybody dies instead of everybody just forgetting about Chaos. Religions can be wiped out, as can history, by supressing it thorougly enough - it's one of the main themes of the Heresy books even!

Funny since one of the main chaos themes is that Slanesh spawned from the eldar, and specially enjoys those alien souls.

Originally Posted by Zorg

You're arging about the culpability of the Imperium for the fall of the Primarchs using both the pre-and post Heresy governmental systems? I know time flows differently in the warp but come on, that's a real stretch.

The Primarchs were not bound by the Adeptus Terra, which hadn't fully formed by the time the Heresy broke out, and were operating as military commanders. They conquered worlds and carried the banner of Terra to the stars, the administration of the worlds after they left completely independant of them (one of the things Lorgar got wrong).

That last part isn't exactly true. The conquered planets were bound to pay tithes to Terra (just like 10.000 years after), the main basis of the "modern" IoM.

Originally Posted by Zorg

The Emperor ordered them to do and not do certain things. One common thing the traitors almost all have is that they did not do or did anyway these things.

Russ received orders from the emperor to bring Magnus back alive, then Horus(which, by your words, the emperor already knew of his treachery, yet let him stay as warmaster) tells Russ to ignore the emperor's orders and kill Magnus. And Russ buys it. And when the dust settles he's considered an outstanding loyalist.

Originally Posted by Zorg

The faults of the 'modern' Imperium are mostly things the Emperor was against - his worship, superstition, dogma. In Outcast Dead an Astropath has visions of the 40k universe, and is so horrified by what he sees compared to waht they're working towards, he kills himself.

So if the traitors hadn't turned, the Imperium would still be lead by the Emperor, had access to the webway, a complete STC system, have little need for Inquisitors, and be generally a pretty cool place to be.

Funny, because one of the last things the emperor did before being turned in a candle corpse was creating the Inquisition, which is described as the most powerful organization in the Imperium. Inquisitors can requisition whole IG armies, planets and even the super-pimped GK. The emperor could've left them explicit orders on that regard "Hey, guys, make sure you keep the imperium atheist and develop science". Yet the Inquisition, one of the last wills of the emperor, goes on to become one of the most horrific parts of the IoM.

Of course, if he knew the heresy was gonna happen all along, why didn't he do anything about it? Why did he send his legions into ambushes? Why did he kept Horus as warmaster instead of throwing him in a cell if he didn't felt like killing him? Somebody who's willing to let the galaxy burn just for the sake of one of his experiments can't really be a nice guy.

Originally Posted by Zorg

In the case of Lorgar, lacking something is no reason to taking the absolute worst possible alternative. Wish you had a girlfriend? Have some heroin! Your boss told you off and made you do a job you don't like? Kill him and all your co-workers!
When those things happen in real life it is a tradgedy, and the person involved is either seen as a victim of those who manipulated them or an insane monster.

In real life, if that kind of people come asking for help, they usually receive it, or at least put under heavy supervision. Specially if they happen to hold important jobs. I highly doubt if the guys tasked with the nuke launching systems started to show drug addiction symptoms or started killing their co-workers, the high brass would just turn a blind eye on it and archive it to be supervised later.

Originally Posted by Zorg

Magnus didn't need to warn the Emperor, he already knew. Furthermore Magnus acknowledged that he did was a terrible, unforgivable mistake and the Emperor was right all along.

Right? Leting the IoM burn, ignoring all the primarchs going mad, creating the Inquisition, leting Horus deceive Russ, and that was being "right"? I tremble to imagine what would've hapened if the emperor was wrong.

Or, you know "Russ, I aknowledge I've wronged, now let us combine our legions to fight the traitors attacking Terra!"

Originally Posted by Zorg

Angron was angry his fellows were left to die - of course he's right to decide to worship the god of bloodshed and seek to murder ever living thing in the galaxy!

That's what the emperor taught him, by leting his companions die and then ordering Angron to go in a killing spree across the galaxy out of nowhere.

Originally Posted by Zorg

There of course existed Option C, (A being do as they're told, B being turn to evil) which none of them explored - talk to the Emperor about these things. But, I suppose that's the Imperium's fault too

Again, the emperor was never much talkative. Even when he knew Horus was going to lead a mass betrayal of the IoM, he wasn't willing to seriously talk with anyone about it.

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

Originally Posted by Squark

Anyway, Ciaphas Cain makes reference to Scrumball (some sort of rugby like game, judging by his description of the violence in the game), and there was apparently some sort of inter-planetary league of some kind.

Harriers For The Cup! was, at one point, seriously considered as the working title for one of the 40k crunch threads

But yes, it works nicely as a plot hook - someone suspects one of the local Scrumball players of using some kind of restricted drug to enhance their performance, and your Inquisitor briefly mentions that he might be interested in finding out who/what his supplier might be.

The end of the mission can be as funny (the guy is taking one of EVERY illicit drug available and hoping for the best) or as genuinely horrific (the guy is a renegade Space Marine, Daemon or dangerously unfettered Psyker in disguise) as you like.

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

Originally Posted by Trixie

Actually, a lot of IG officers in Cain series seems to use bolt weapons, not to mention covers of books in said series...

The covers of the Cain books are basically propaganda posters. They show CAIN using a bolt pistol, even though in the books, he turns down anything higher powered than his laspistol because his experience with the laspistol makes aiming it reflexive for him. They also show him standing triumphantly among the corpses of the enemies of the Imperium, which isn't particularly Cain-like.

And Colonels and Majors having bolt pistols is rather different from the rank and file getting the same; if I remember right, they don't even show any officers below that using bolt weapons, though I might be wrong. Heavy bolters are used as support weapons, and regular bolters don't come up much, as far as I remember.

Even Cain's suicide mission squad in For the Emperor, when getting armed with better armor and weapons, only gets hellguns, not bolters. Vail uses a bolt pistol, and Cain keeps his trusty laspistol.

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

I have to give you one thing, you do rack up the averae wordcount in this thread.
Ok, lets do this *cracks knuckles*

Originally Posted by deuterio12

His whole legion just stood there watching as Angrom's companions were butchered. What do you think that teached the primarch? First impressions are quite important.

I've seen that claim here and there, but honestly, it simply doesn't make any sense. If the emperor knew Horus was a traitor, why did he leave him around still giving orders (like telling the furries to kill Magnus instead of capturing him)?

I don't know much about this part, I'll leave it it to Lord Zorg the Wise.

As already pointed out Russ had orders to kill from corrupted Horus, so I don't see how he could be asking for surrender. It doesn't say anything about that here, and it doesn't fit either with the rest of your quote. So Russ is willing to butcher the thousand sons to the last man, but Magnus gets the chance to come unharmed? Shouldn't this the time Magnus goes "Do what you want with me, but spare my subordinates!".

Because russ was not stupid and psychotic. It is just common sense that if the enemy surrenders you don't have to thow away legionaries' lives.

It just doesn't make much sense that Magnus is in one moment "All my legion and world must die in bloody battle"(he could've just nuked his own planet, an IoM classic) and the next he goes "Save me Tzenceth I'll do whatever you want!".

Do you honestly think Magnus was so suicidal he wanted his guys to die? and why would he nuke is own planet? he loved that place. For the last bit, it was a case of good ol' "OH GODS WOLVES ARE KILLING EVERYONE, WHAT DO I DO NOW?"

Well, last time I checked people never performed worship just for the sake of it. They worship because they believe it will bring them some sort of good/advantage. Lorgar believed worship was a powerful tool, and its quite ironic his works ended up being used to create the IoM's own religion.

Theology will get me (and you, be careful please) banned, not responding here.

Last time I checked, the Emperor was never amused for being questioned in any kind of matter, neither was the kind of person to explain his actions. He's more the kind of "I'm gonna seal myself on my lab, not telling you what I'll be working in, and you're all forbidden from interrupting me".

Except these guys are the Primarchs. The third to twentythird most powerfull guys in the imperium with some of the most important jobs in the galaxy.

Not a very good plan, since the chaos gods do feed on other races. Slaanesh was spawned by the eldar and everything.

Indeed Horus's story hasn't aged very well. But since the most recent fluff seems to qualify as the most valid, he's now a Commander Incopentus
by betraying his father for just a vision.

But recent fluff does not invalidate older fluff that does not clash. and in the older fluff he is the best there ever was. Furthermore, he almost killed the emperor before kicking the bucket himself. Its like saying a boxer is terrible at boxing because he hurt a knuckle pulping your face.

Unless he had his personal bomber and went doing strafing runs on the cities, he couldn't really rack up anywhere the same kill count of your average IoM planetary government. One of his main characteristics was actually being discret. People he doesn't like show up dead, but everybody else around didn't even notice he was then, instead of dying as colateral damage.

He was discreet up to the point where he revealed himself as the killing dude and ruled as a king for a while.

He left because the emperor ordered him to do so (and we all know how good an idea is disagreeing with the emperor). He couldn't have really changed anything before without trustworthy loyal followers. He could've maybe done something with his legion, but hey, gotta go conquer more planets for daddy or he'll be mad (trivia, the emperor quite disliked that Lorgar took his time to make sure the conquered populations were properly subjugated before moving on).

Thats a strawman here. There is no connection between Conrad before empy and the empy telling him to leave.

You're forgeting the part where Curze had horrific visions of the future, and when he tried to talk about how he felt with the other primarchs, they all refused to help him sort out his head. Trillions of people in the IoM, not any kind of mental doctor or friendly voice to help him. Anyone suprised he ended up turning?

This one is to blame on the old fluff. Curze is stated as having no friends so the writers coudn't have him have friends.

Indeed it says that, but usually you'll want to have a good talk with your commanders/sons after the first news of something being wrong with them, not when they have already rampaged trough countless planets. He left them run wild just too much time.

rampaging though planets is what space marines do all the time, the World Eaters were just rather enthusiastic about it. Nothing wrong with them doing their job, the emperor just did not like how far they went with it.

You still haven't covered why Cruze blowing up his own homeworld and then going into a campaign of terrior is something that can be archived to take care of later, but Magnus doing one communication spell is reason for immediate repriesal.

magnus messed with the Emperors own pet project here, the one project which would have saved the imperium forever. its the difference between Curze knocking down a shed somewhere and magnus blowing up his dads home.

And again, the fluff points again and again that the Emperor wasn't really much for family discussions and/or mental support. He left quite clear that his orders were to be obeyed, never questioned.

Strawman again, be careful with those please, they really hurt what you say. The original point was that when they heard that burning a house down is fun they went ahead and tried it where they should have asked anyone if it might be a good idea first.

Funny since one of the main chaos themes is that Slanesh spawned from the eldar, and specially enjoys those alien souls.

To slaanesh, the eldar are kaviar, humanity is potato mash.

That last part isn't exactly true. The conquered planets were bound to pay tithes to Terra (just like 10.000 years after), the main basis of the "modern" IoM.

yes, but the whole tithes idea was not created until the whole campaign was well underway.

Russ received orders from the emperor to bring Magnus back alive, then Horus(which, by your words, the emperor already knew of his treachery, yet let him stay as warmaster) tells Russ to ignore the emperor's orders and kill Magnus. And Russ buys it. And when the dust settles he's considered an outstanding loyalist.

Russ did what the emperor said, with or without Horus' involvement. He went to prospero and told Magnus to surrender. Magnus told him to shove it under his tail and everything went downhill from there.

Funny, because one of the last things the emperor did before being turned in a candle corpse was creating the Inquisition, which is described as the most powerful organization in the Imperium. Inquisitors can requisition whole IG armies, planets and even the super-pimped GK. The emperor could've left them explicit orders on that regard "Hey, guys, make sure you keep the imperium atheist and develop science". Yet the Inquisition, one of the last wills of the emperor, goes on to become one of the most horrific parts of the IoM.

By that point, mister emperor knew he had failed and was just performing damage control.

Of course, if he knew the heresy was gonna happen all along, why didn't he do anything about it? Why did he send his legions into ambushes? Why did he kept Horus as warmaster instead of throwing him in a cell if he didn't felt like killing him? Somebody who's willing to let the galaxy burn just for the sake of one of his experiments can't really be a nice guy.

he did not know all along, just for a while. IIRC The people of the Eisenstein informed him.

In real life, if that kind of people come asking for help, they usually receive it, or at least put under heavy supervision. Specially if they happen to hold important jobs. I highly doubt if the guys tasked with the nuke launching systems started to show drug addiction symptoms or started killing their co-workers, the high brass would just turn a blind eye on it and archive it to be supervised later.

Analogy
Lorgar picks his nose where the emperor just told him that picking your nose is impolite.
Emperor tells Lorgar he should not pick his nose.
Lorgar decides to do heroin and set a puppy on fire.

He could, maybe, possibly, told his dad that he likes picking his nose and that since he is not doing it in company it shouldn't hurt. To which the emperor would have responded with a explanation why picking his nose will give him terrible nosebleeds.

Right? Leting the IoM burn, ignoring all the primarchs going mad, creating the Inquisition, leting Horus deceive Russ, and that was being "right"? I tremble to imagine what would've hapened if the emperor was wrong.

Right about " do not do sorcery, it is bad" not right about "everything, ever".

That's what the emperor taught him, by leting his companions die and then ordering Angron to go in a killing spree across the galaxy out of nowhere.

Warning, Zorg is being sarcastic here.

Again, the emperor was never much talkative. Even when he knew Horus was going to lead a mass betrayl of the IoM, he wasn't willing to seriously talk with anyone about it.

By the time he knew the whole thing was already snowballing out of control and you can be damn sure he tried to stop Horus (ever heard of this little event called the Dropsite Massacre? you should read about it)

I do have to say, I'm starting to enjoy your posts. They offer a different view at what we see as canon. Usually this view is easily shot down but at least we think about it.

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

Quick one before I duck out - the Emperor knew of Horus' betrayal before Magnus' message by regular means: thousands of Astropathic communications going "OMG Horus has gone crazy and massacred half his d00dz". So Magnus' warning was unnecessary in the most basic sense and achieved nothing.
Evil Horus telling Russ to kill Magnus is gone, as the sacking of Prospero occurs roughly simultaneously with the Drop Site Massacre (I'm going by 'first hand sources' - GW books, not wikis).

Also big thanks for all those suggestions - more later

Princess in the streets.
Princess in the sheets.
Don't touch me I'm royalty.

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

Hmm... Do the 40k rulebooks have rules for the players getting infected? Now, for novices, you'd probably have to just kill the character, but if someone's a good enough role-player... Could make for an interesting story...

Creatures Anathema for Dark Heresy has the Genestealer, and I believe it also has rules for infection. It's not pleasant, and as far as I remember, almost certain death or turning, whichever it actually does to you.

And Deuterio12, I believe you confuse the Imperium of the 41. millenium with the Imperium of the time the Emperor was actually around, or at least treat them as the same entity. Both were radically different.

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

Originally Posted by Zorg

Except, as Outcast Dead lays out, the Emperor already knew. A Thousand Sons also portrays Magnus' idea as wanting to prove that sorcery can be useful (and his being a puppet for Tzeentch the whole time after their deal).

Loads of people were telling the Emperor that Horus was bad. There's this one dude...Nathaniel Garro - the greatest Space Marine ever - he goes on a quest to tell the Emperor, and tells Dorn, who in turn tells Dad.

Rogal Dorn already told Dad that Horus had gone bad. Magnus was stupid doing it the way he did and he admitted it later on.

He only took the out offered by Tzeentch when he couldn't bear seeing his sons slaughtered anymore.

QFT. Magnus hates Tzeentch. The choice was simply "Join or die."

Note that at no point does he question "hey, maybe there's a reason dad never told me about this?", or go and ask the Emperor why he lied.

However in First Heretic, Magnus was as much help when Lorgar spoke to him. Magnus' response simply being "Calm down li'l buddy, you don't know what you're doing." And Lorgar storming away from Magnus.

In Aurelian, Lorgar seems...Not so angry at Magnus. Seeming to understand how bad Chaos is now that he's in it.

Compare the suddenness of Horus' heel turn to Magnus', which only comes at the very end of A Thosand Sons and isn't really a turn at all, or to Lorgar's which is very nuanced and spread across several books.

Fulgrim's Fall, is quite sudden. But the way in which it's told is...Wow. Far better than Horus'. Same with Alpharius'. Like Zorg, I feel that Horus' is the worst story of the lot.

If the first three books were subtitled "How Erebus ruined the Imperium from the ground level." and told that story, I'd reckon the first three 30K Novels would be great. But, instead, we see Horus have a dream and then decide to take down the Emperor.

It's not a lobotomy, and some of the background material says the Emperor was going to censure the World Eaters (and Night Lords) for their ever mroe extreme actions, but they rebelled first.

Curze was censured by Fulgrim and Dorn [The Dark King]. Actually being imprisoned on the Phalanx and being taken to Dad when he escapes the Phalanx (because he's the god-damn Batman!), nearly rips Dorn in half (Dorn wouldn't fight back), and heads back to Nostromo and when he gets there...Well that's history.

The faults of the 'modern' Imperium are mostly things the Emperor was against - his worship, superstition, dogma. In Outcast Dead an Astropath has visions of the 40k universe, and is so horrified by what he sees compared to waht they're working towards, he kills himself.

The 40K Imperium is run exactly the way Lorgar and Curze said it would be. Curze is a scary dude, when you get right down to it. Mostly because his political philosophy works so well. I could cite some real-world examples (current, even, scarily enough), but I like it here.

That aforementioned event scars Dorn for life. Curze now being the only thing in the Universe that Dorn fears. Not because Curze nearly killed him, but because Dorn figures out what Curze is fighting for, and how many steps it would take for Dorn to become like Curze.

But, then again, Dorn is the 40K equivalent of a Paladin, but he still considers Curze's standpoint. And, I suppose if you're Dorn, the only thing in the galaxy you would be afraid of is Curze, who is the Anti-Dorn (not Horus).

Steam Name: Cheesegear
League of Legends Name: Cheesegear
You can fight like a krogan or run like a leopard but you'll never be better than Commander Shepard.

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

Looking good! I'd suggest maybe putting some typical "Thought for the day" or such on the bottom of each page - you know, all those "an open mind is like a fortress with its gates unbarred" and "blessed the mind too narrow for doubt" quotes that demonstrate so aptly what an oppressive, anti-intellectual regime the Imperium is. It would serve as a rather nice contrast to the much more "normal" newspaper and emphasize to the players that this is not just our society with more tech.

LGBTitPSupporterIn a Wonderland they lie, Dreaming as the days go by, Dreaming as the summers die - Ever drifting down the stream - Lingering in the golden gleam - Life, what is it, but a dream?- Lewis Carroll

Re: Warhammer 40k fluff thread VI: They see me Ward'en, they haten

I must confess that I actually stole those as a future reference if I ever need to make newspapers for my D&D group.
But I would like to point out that I have a bit of a hard time making out the titles, I don't know whether is it due to resolution or font, but I have to really focus on titles to read them.